Those Nights
by Ani101
Summary: Songfic tag to No Rest For The Wicked, Sam thinking back on his life with Dean based on Those Nights by Skillet. Oneshot.


**This is not connected to Dreaming True which is the multi-chapter story I am posting at the moment...but I just thought of it listening to the song and I just had to write it. Promise I'll update the other soon! Sorry to everyone following it for the delay!**

**This is technically a songfic, set right after _No Escape For The Wicked_ but a bit before what we see in _I Know What You Did Last Summer._ Basically it's Sam reflecting on his life with Dean based on the song _Those Nights_ by Skillet as he grieves for him. Oneshot. Hope you like it! All the flashback scenes are my own.**

**This is my first songfic so I'd really appreciate your telling me anything wrong with it!**

**I don't own Supernatural or Skillet though I wish I did!**

**Those Nights**

Sam sat alone and broken in the attic of Bobby's house. He was curled into himself, pressed against the wall, unable to comprehend what had happened. The rain outside was hammering against the glass panes, the sky was black. Beside him lay the open coffin, inside which lay the mangled, bloody body of Dean Winchester. And the ruin of everything Sam held dear.

He put his head in his hands and sobbed. The memories came thick and fast, inescapable. He could not do this. Could not fight this. He remembered.

_**I remember when**_

_**We used to laugh **_

_**About nothing at all**_

_**It was better than going mad**_

_**From trying to solve all the problems we're going through**_

_**Forget'em all**_

_"Dean, what if..."_

_ "No, Sammy, you gotta stop thinking about it!"_

_ Sam whirled round to face his brother, who was lounging in the chair of their motel room, swigging from a bottle of beer. _

_ "Dean, everything we've seen points to this! I'm gonna be a killer, the demon wants us all to be killers! Don't ask me why but it's gonna happen!" He was terrified-Ava was gone, Scott was dead...Max, Andy...every one of the psychics was doomed. How could he be so sure that he could resist when no-one else could?_

_ Dean got up. He looked slightly annoyed, but more than that he looked...determined. Oddly enough it was an expression that calmed Sam's panic slightly, here on this darkest, most frightening night._

_ "Look, Sammy," Dean said seriously. "I'm not going to let anything bad happen to ya, you hear me? You're not a killer. You never will be. I might make you want to be, thought..."_

_ Sam blinked, surprised out of his panic. "What d'you mean?"_

_ Dean grinned. And he jerked his hand, spraying beer out of the bottle still in his hand all over his brother's face. Sam yelled and spluttered, glaring at Dean through the dripping liquid. Dean grinned and swallowed what was left in the bottle._

_ "You want something to drink?" he suggested cheerfully._

_ "I swear, Dean..." And Sam knew that Dean was just trying to take his mind off something they had no control over, knew that his brother was as scared as he was. But he knew that he was not alone. And that was why he laughed, even though it wasn't that funny, fell down in a chair and laughed almost hysterically, until he wasn't sure if he was laughing at all, or crying. But it was okay, because Dean was with him._

_ "Jerk," he muttered at last. Dean looked delighted._

_ "B*tch."_

_**'Cause all those nights**_

_**We would stand and**_

_**Never fall together**_

_**We faced it all**_

_ "Okay, Sammy," Dean ordered. "Fire when I say. Try and hit it this time, 'kay?"_

_ "Ha, ha," Sam muttered. "You're the one taught me to shoot, jerk." _

_ He was seventeen, and he and Dean were in charge of ridding a certain haunted house of the spirits that infested it. Dad had gone to the graveyard to get at the bones-he and Dean just had to hold the things off. As far as Dean was concerned, all they had to do was shoot, and keep shooting. _

_ Even as Sam watched his brother flung the door open and began firing at the grey mass within. Sam only hesitated an instant, then raised his own gun and added to his brother's assault. The spirits behind the door did not know what hit them-they screamed and cowered, vanishing and reappearing as the Winchester brothers desecrated their ranks with pistols loaded with rock salt. Dean was laughing, Sam realised. Just a routine hunt to him. Maybe for both of them. Just them against the world, without-though Sam felt guilty admitting it even to himself;-Dad around to complicate things. Sam and Dean against the world._

_**Remember when we'd**_

_**Stay up late and we'd talk all night **_

_**In the dark room lit by the TV light**_

_**Through all the hard times in my life**_

_**Those nights kept me alive**_

_Dean struggled into the motel room, half carrying his semiconscious younger brother. Sam moaned softly as Dean laid him down on the bed and went for the lights; his hand was clasped against the side of his chest, blood seeping from between his fingers._

_ "Dammit," Dean swore quietly. "Lights are broken. This place is even worse than normal." He grabbed the remote, turned on the grainy, flickering television and muted it, turning back to his brother in the faint light it emitted. "C'mon Sammy, let's take a look at the bullet wound huh?"_

_ "Uh...okay," Sam whispered, eyes closed. "Dean..."_

_ "Hey, hey. Stay with me, kiddo." Dean sat down on the edge of the bed, and gently propped his little brother up in his arms; Sam's head lolled back onto his shoulder, weak and cold from blood loss. It was six months since Jessica had died, and right now all Dean wanted to do after Sam had been shot running away from a crime scene was call their father...but he had wanted to do that for a long time. Now he pulled Sam's hand away from the wound in his side, and with his knife cut away the part of the kid's shirt that was sticking to it. Dean grimaced. It was nasty. He was going to have to dig the bullet out._

_ "Okay, Sammy, this is gonna hurt like hell so you go ahead and pass out if you want..."_

_ "Huh?" Sam tried to look up but with the movement pain split through him and he gasped sharply. Dean fumbled in his bag for the whisky and poured some into Sam's mouth-caught by surprise, the young hunter choked and gasped it down._

_ "Knowing you you'll be out in seconds now," Dean muttered, as he began to search for the bullet. It was a grisly job, but one he was used to, and in a few seconds he had pulled the bullet clear of his brother's side. Sam, who had been tensed in pain throughout the operation, now relaxed slightly as Dean pressed a wad of cloth against the wound to stem the bleeding. Dean could tell that Sam was barely conscious any longer, a combination of blood loss and strong alcohol, and it made it easier for him to bind a rough bandage around the bullet hole. _

_ "Hey, Sammy," he called softly when he was done. "You still with me?"_

_ "Yeah..." Sam tried again to get up and this time Dean put an arm around his shoulders and helped him. Sam blinked up at him sleepily and Dean wondered how the hell his twenty-two-year-old, overgrown brother could still seem to so small and innocent. "Dean," the youth mumbled, eyes already closing. "Thanks?"_

_ "Can't have you bleeding all over my jacket now can I?" Dean quipped. Sam just smiled as he slowly lost consciousness and Dean at last laid him down on the bed, pulling the cleaner blankets up around him. He smiled. It was times like these that he really knew just how much he loved this stubborn, troubled geek boy he called his baby brother._

_ Some time in the middle of the night Dean was roused by a weak voice calling his name from the other bed. He looked up, dizzy with sleep, squinting through the darkness. The voice came again. _

_ "Hey, Dean...you awake?"_

_ "No," Dean replied. "I'm sleeptalking." A soft laugh. Wow, Dean thought. Sam must be exhausted if he's admitting I'm funny. "You feeling okay, Sammy?"_

_ "Yeah...you know the lights don't work in here?"_

_ "It's gotta be the first time I've patched someone up by the light of a Toy Story 2 rerun."_

_ "Dean..." Bedsprings creaked as Sam moved. "Dean, you know Cassie..."_

_ "Oh, God, you're still on that? Talk about a one-track mind..."_

_ "Seriously, Dean...I've been thinking and y'know if you'd wanted..."_

_ "Sammy, are you sure you're not a girl? 'Cause all this chick-flick crap is making me wonder..."_

_ "You're avoiding the question."_

_ "And you just got shot. Go back to sleep."_

_ "You don't want to talk about her? Fine, but-"_

_ "_Sam_. Go to sleep, dammit..."_

_**Listen to the radio play all night**_

_**Didn't wanna go home to another fight**_

_**Through all the hard times in my life**_

_**Those nights kept me alive**_

_"Jeez, Sam," Dean sighed, appearing out of the night like a ghost and pressing his face against the Impala window. "You couldn't find a better place to hide than my car?" He must have known Dean would find him here, in the car, in the parking lot of the motel they were currently staying in, the black car half-hidden in the shadows though it was._

_ "Shut up." Sam folded his arms and turned up the volume on the cassette player. Dean shrugged and unlocked the door-Sam scowled. Maybe he should have taken Dean's spare key as well. He did not look at his brother as the eighteen-year-old folded himself into the Impala's driving seat and grimaced at the music._

_ "Bon Jovi, Sam. Seriously?" Sam did not reply. Dean sighed. "C'mon, Sammy. Dad told you why you have to come. There's two vampires, we need you. Isn't that more important than going to some soccer match?"_

_ "He didn't have to scream at me I was a disappointment and Mom would be ashamed of me," Sam muttered, voice barely audible over the music. Dean leaned his head back into the seat-the kid was only fourteen, someone so young shouldn't be physically capable of annoying Dad so much. But still..._

_ "Look, Sammy, I know he was a little harsh, but..."_

_ "My name is _Sam_!"_

_ "Yeah, yeah, I know...just give him a chance, wouldja?"_

_ Sam glared at him through wide, hurt hazel eyes. "He doesn't give me one."_

_ Dean reached out and turned the volume of the music down-it was driving him insane. His brother listened to such crappy music..._

_ "Sammy, he just lost it. You were being a bit of a b*tch y'know."_

_ "I was not! Just 'cause you never stand up to him..."_

_ "Sam, when he tells us to do something it's for a reason. He's the best hunter I've ever heard of and you think he got that way doing what his teenage kids tell him?"_

_ "He hates me," Sam said simply. "He likes you, though. Maybe I should just take off and leave you guys to it."_

_ "Hey!" Dean cried in sudden anger. "Don't ever say that and don't you ever think of running away, you hear me? Dad doesn't hate you, Sam, you take it from me as your awesome big brother who's always right. He's trying to protect you." He rifled through the glove box and pulled out a cassette tape. "Now, time for some real music." He shoved the tape into the cassette player and Sam groaned as the familiar crashing clanged through the car. Fight Fire With Fire. One of Dean's favourite songs. _

_ "At least my music is comprehensible," Sam muttered._

_ "'**What in the hell is this world coming to**?'" Dean chanted along with the singer. "C'mon, Sam. Lighten up. It's just music and it's just Dad. Like always. You coming in?"_

_ "No," Sam said. "I'm staying right here."_

_ "Forever?"_

_ Sam scowled. "Maybe."_

_ "Even if it means joining in with my awesomeness with music taste?"_

_ Sam glanced at his brother against the dark glass of the window, and just for an instant, behind the bravado and cockiness, he saw a real tenderness in his green eyes, and a smile slipped involuntarily to his face._

_ "Even if," he said._

_**I remember when**_

_**We used to drive**_

_**Anywhere but here**_

_**As long as we'd forget our lives**_

_The Impala sped over the road like lightning and Sam was pressed back in his seat, slightly alarmed. It was dark and wet, and Dean was going to get them both killed at speeds like this._

_ "Hey, Dean, you don't think you're over the speed limit just a little?"_

_ "I like it this fast," Dean muttered. Sam raised his eyebrows._

_ "You like it suicidal then!" Instantly he wished he had not said that. They had scarcely recovered from first learning about Dean's deal, respectively-Sam drive, desperate, searching every book and internet site he could find for a way to save him, Dean angry and impulsive, uncaring. Both of them waking from screaming nightmares over and over again. It was not a good time to talk about suicide. He saw Dean's face close at his hasty words, and abruptly his brother spun the car around, pulling over to the side, and cut the engine._

_ "You know what, Sammy?" Dean said fiercely, turning so he could see clearly into his younger brother's eyes. "I'm not suicidal. I might be, later. I'm not gonna lie to you and say I'm okay. I'm going to hell, Sam. But trust me. I am not ever going to do anything to hurt you, you understand? I am going to make sure you survive this no matter what, even if I don't."_

_ Sam stared at him, speechless. Dean never opened up like this, never. It just wasn't like him...and now, one of the first times he had ever heard his brother bare his soul to him, he could think of nothing to say, nothing at all. But Dean was not waiting for an answer; he restarted the engine and swung back onto the road, driving faster than ever._

_ "I'm going to save you," Sam said at last. "I am going to find a way."_

_ Dean did not reply, eyes focused on the horizon, the Impala throbbing with life beneath him. Life that all too soon would be snatched away._

_ He was just going to have to run fast while he still could._

As the memories washed over Sam he could not breathe for a moment-he had tried so hard to save Dean, so hard. And he had failed. There had to have been something he could have done. Something. Anything. Dean had sacrificed everything for him, and Sam had failed him in return.

_**We were so young and confused that we didn't know**_

_**To live or cry**_

_**'Cause all those nights**_

_**We would live and never die together**_

_**We stand forever**_

_Dean was staring at the body on the floor in utter devastation. He and Sam had been hunting a nightshifter in a bar in some small town somewhere in Wisconsin, and they had become separated. Now, seeing this, he knew that his life was over._

_ The shifter had become angry after they had shot at it a few times, and now Sam was lying here on the floor, clearly dead, a horrific wound in his chest as if someone had ripped their hand through it. Dean could not believe it-after his deal, after giving his soul for Sam's life, his brother had been killed, just like that? It was not possible, and Dean could only sit there, staring at the body with a kind of numb horror._

_ Then suddenly, running footsteps-a voice screamed- "Dean, look out!" His head jerked up, and at that moment Sam abruptly sat up, reached out and gripped his neck, and began to squeeze. Dean struggled desperately but could not break free-his sight was already flickering-_

_ And then a gunshot, and Sam-not Sam, the shifter-was thrown back off him. Dean, gasping for breath, looked up to see the real Sam standing there, holding the gun with which he had just shot the shifter through the head. He extended a hand to Dean, who took it and got to his feet._

_ "Hell, Sammy, I thought you were dead..."_

_ Sam looked puzzled. "Dean. We've seen those things turn into dead bodies before, remember?"_

_ Dean shrugged, trying to regain his composure. "Yeah, well...I was just making sure. You interrupted."_

_ Sam did not look convinced. Dean did not blame him. _

_ "Look, dude," Sam said at last. "I'm not going to die on you. I'm gonna find a way to save you, I promise. We are _both_ going to survive this."_

_ "Then let's get outa here before the cops show up," Dean suggested. He did not want to talk about the deal thing again-he had four months left and Sam was becoming more and more erratic in looking for ways to save him. It was worrying him-he knew that Sam was worried about him, too. What a messed-up pair..._

_ They fled the battered bar together into the night, heading for where they had left the Impala concealed in the shadows in an alley. Dean yanked open the door and was just about to get in when he noticed Sam still standing there staring at him. He raised his hands._

_ "What is it, Sammy? You zoned out or something?"_

_ "You have to believe me," Sam told him with a quiet defiance. "You have to. I'm going to save you."_

_ Dean got into the car and did not answer. Sam, still standing leaning on the side, stared into the night with a sudden desolation. He could not let Dean die. He would not be able to go on without him. He was going to do whatever it took to cheat the demons of their prize-while he breathed, Dean could not go to hell. The world did not work that way, it could not be that terrible. There had to be a way._

_**Those nights belong to us**_

_**There's nothing wrong with us**_

_**Those nights belong to us**_

__Sam covered his eyes, trying to shut it all out. _Dean playing pool and poker, raking up the money. Cheating too. He had taught Sam to play when he was twelve years old-he had taught Sam everything. Been everything. Dean patching up his injuries, dragging him from their own private battlefields, because somehow Sam always got himself hurt. Dean swigging from his bottle of beer in a smoky bar, winking at the girls across the room while Sam rolled his eyes. Dean headbanging in the front seat of the Impala to his crazy music. _

_**I remember when**_

_**We used to laugh**_

_**Now I wish those nights would last**_

_ Dean lay in Sam's arms, chest torn viciously open, soaked in blood, body stiff and rigid. His blood-spattered eyes stared blindly, glassily at the ceiling-there was nothing left of him, nothing at all. He was empty, lost. And Sam could not stand it. He knelt there, cradling his brother's body in his arms, the tears spilling over his face, unable to believe that this could be happening-unable to believe that anything could ever hurt this much. Dean was gone, and he was not coming back. He was dead and his soul was screaming in hell. And there was nothing, absolutely nothing, that Sam could do about it. And that was something he just could not stand. He knew that the pain was going to kill him, he wished that Lilith had managed it. He had nothing left to go on for._

Sam leaned back against the wall, fighting to breathe through the pain inside him. He did not think he could go on-Dean's body was broken beside him, and before long Bobby would make Sam bury him, put him in the ground and leave him there alone. At least Sam had managed to prevent the hunter from deciding to cremate Dean...because it meant there was still a chance. Dean deserved to live so much more than Sam did-Sam who was so selfish and confused and not even fully human...why should Dean die for him? It made no sense.

And that was why Sam was going to have to find a way to change things. No matter what, he was going to have to drag Dean back out of hell. Whatever it took.

His whole life Dean had been there for him, pulling him out of whatever mess he got himself into, teasing him, being there for him. Sam could not imagine living without him.

He stood up and stumbled across to the window, pressing his face against the cold glass. Outside the night loomed dark and black, a bleak and terrifying world without Dean in it. Of all the monsters they had ever faced, this was the worst of all.

All those nights we fought and laughed together, Sam thought. All those nights you were there for me. I'm going to get you out of there, Dean. I have to. I can't do this without you. I'll do it for all those nights we were together.

**I just had to do something from this time, Sam's darkest time...and I really needed to look back on some brotherly love myself because of how the series is going at the moment...this is absolutely NOT SLASH, I just want to stress that. I hope you liked it, please review and tell me what you think! As I said before I've never done a songfic before so if I've messed up anything please let me know!**

**And I have to say that if you don't know the song it is definitely worth looking up! I just feel it fits Sam and Dean at this point so well...**

**Thanks for reading!**

**Ani**


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